I've had a very busy past few weeks working on a side project (stupid cosplay stuff) and its been eating into my comic making schedule. Thankfully I will have more time starting next week and plan to start working on updates again! Don't worry I'm not quitting!

Hope to be posting again regularly in the next week, so keep a look out for the exciting conclusion!

Time for a huge epic battle, let's hope Nate can make it across the field and into the bunker without getting hurt!

Just a heads up, I'm going to have to skip Wednesday's update this week unfortunately. I have a lot going on with my real job this week and won't have the time to get a page done in time for it. Sorry in advance!

This is your monthly reminder to continually save as you work! Lost half this page last night and had to remake the bottom half all over again just as I was finishing. Thankfully I was able to finish it for today!

I threw this mega evolution scene into the script a few months back, I thought it would be pretty cool. Shout out to "Kevin Deeffon" for making these awesome Mega Charizard X sprites!

Now with Charlie powered up, they stand a better chance against the bird trio!

@Nashew: Hah as I have stated in the comic, he lived in seclusion with his father. He had no friends, he didn't attend trainer school, he was forbidden from really interacting with Pokemon outside of taking a few photos of the ones in the area. He may have learned a lot so far on his adventure, but theres a whole lot more out there it seems!

And with that we are heading off to the final major confrontation, of course we all know it won't be as easy as strolling on in and saving them! Nate and Cubone are in for a few surprises!

On a side note, I totally didn't realize that as of last week it was one year since I started this comic again! Its amazing to see it so close to completion! In one short year I managed to make over 125 new pages! I'm sure if I had a little more freedom and didn't miss all those updates earlier in the spring I would have completed it! Won't be long now, however!

Also, to those of you who celebrate Thanksgiving, enjoy tomorrow! I should have an update on friday still, so look forward to that!

Oh man, it's that police officer from page #14! Seems as though he's been helping out the poachers all along. Probably explains how they are able to go unnoticed until rather recently!

In other news, I had the opportunity to have “The Taken” reviewed by @Ultizeta yesterday. Although, he wasn’t a fan of the story or the artstyle, I appreciate his feedback nonetheless. Check it out here: ultireviewscomics.smackjeeves.com

(Also any of you are more than welcome to give your reviews on the comic as well! I would love to hear from more of you and would even feature the reviews if given the chance!)

It kind of actually inspired me to finally go back and start making changes to some older pages. I recently printed the entire comic and had a friend edit it for any grammar/spelling/phrasing issues, which I started to make last night. Once I feel good about the text I will be going back to make some minor changes to some older visuals as well. Feel free to check back every so often, I did the first 3 last night!

Hi! Thanks so much for the review! I really appreciate you putting the work in despite not really enjoying the comic! If it’s okay I'd like to offer some further insight in regard to some of your points.

I've been making sprite comics for well over 10 years at this point. I'm terrible at drawing, and when I first started sprinting, I truly felt I had found a medium that I could properly tell my stories in. Back in the day, there were dozens and dozens of Pokemon sprite comics with very little differentiating them. This pushed me to develop my “style” of spriting, using the basic video game sprites as a base, and taking bits and pieces of backgrounds to make these nice looking three-dimensional set pieces. I always found something so charming about the juxtaposition of the basic character models on these newer backdrops. I feel it really makes the characters pop.

Now yes, I totally agree with you that the sprites themselves leave a lot to be desired but that makes working with them so much better. They are so easily manipulated to work in my favor compared to others. I will say, I could have made additional edits like adding mouths to help further convey more emotions. At the end of the day, I feel they work best for the story I’m trying to tell.

In regard to the story itself, I was very inspired from the anime when writing the early pages of the comic. I wanted to create something familiar and nostalgic with a little bit of a twist that would draw the readers (especially ones that haven’t been interested in Pokemon since it first came out) before fully diving further into more of the plot later on. I always liked to describe the first 100 pages as kind of an introduction, as you meet all the major players and see what they have to offer the story. The back end of the comic really dives into Nate and Cubone’s plot. I put careful thought into balancing the main plot with all the side fun deviations like the Gym battles.

The single most important aspect of the comic I put extra effort into are the characters themselves, so this is the one aspect of your review that really upsets me. My first comic PCC was always heavily criticized for having bland and generic characters, so when writing “The Taken,” I had put them first and foremost. A lot of their personalities are based off of real people in my life, and I made sure to show actual growth from start to finish. One great example is Joshy’s temper in the first half.

Thank you again for the review, I really appreciate all your feedback as it’s hard to come by now-a-days on here. I do hope that you will keep reading as I’m closing in on the end, and maybe it will help put to rest some of your story concerns!

Keep doing what you do! Sometimes a little negative feedback is just what someone needs to hear to inspire them to do better!

(P.S. LOL I’m well aware about my spelling/grammar issues! It’s for sure this comics greatest downfall! Don’t worry I plan on going back and making all the corrections soon!)